Almost
by caffeineaddict13
Summary: Five times Bella Swan thought she was in love, and the one time she knew it.


**A/N:** I love those "Five times" things. Hope this lives up.

-- _one_ --

She was six, gluing together popsicle sticks in art class. They were making frames and Bella's held a picture of her and Renee, covered in chocolate cake on her fifth birthday party.

Andrew Rocklin sat next to her, and when the bell was about to ring he held up his finished product for her to see.

It wasn't a photo, not like Bella's was. It was a drawing of _her_, messy but beautiful, brown hair dabbed with pastels. Andrew smiled and Bella kissed him, sending a blush deeper than hers through his cheeks.

For the next four weeks, Andrew was tormented with calls of "cooties!" from the other boys in their class, and eight years later he would date Bella's best friend and she would pretend she never thought she could've loved him.

-- _two_ --

The summer Bella was eleven, Trent Vern came over every three weeks to mow the lawn.

She would call her friend Alyssa up and they would watch from the window in their tank tops and shorts, chewing on granola bars and sipping lemonade. He was tan and muscular and fifteen, and he had this blond hair that would always fall in front of his eyes when he was working.

One of these days, Bella ventured outside to offer him a drink, Alyssa giggling madly from inside the house as she did. Trent smiled and took the glass, lifting it high and finishing it in a few swallows.

When he handed it back he tilted his head and, his mouth still wet, said, "You look nice today," before turning the mower on high.

Bella walked back inside completely dazed, immediately turned to Alyssa, whispered, "I think I love him," and grinned.

-- _three_ --

At fourteen, Bella became obsessed with books. She spent almost every day at the library, after-hours, when it was quiet and empty. It was one of these such days, when there wasn't any sound except for the clock in the corner and the dusty hum of the radiator, that she noticed Patrick Till.

Patrick was two years her senior and he wasn't actually that good-looking. His eyes were a muted gray and his hair was always sticking up in the wrong directions, big and dark and completely the opposite of his thin frame.

Bella saw him sitting in the corner by the window, his legs bending awkwardly against his chest. She asked him if he could help her, blushing wildly as she did, because a page was torn out of her copy of _Lolita_, and she had seen him reading the same thing.

He smiled and she noticed that one of his teeth was slightly crooked – an imperfection that made his grin beautiful. She forgot about his wrinkled shirt and the way he always looked too tall, concentrated on the way he smelled like soap and apples as he shared his book with her.

Bella spent the next three weeks imagining what it would be like to kiss Patrick Till. And it wasn't blood-driven lust or fairytale romance, but the silver ring on his thumb and the way he mouthed the words on the page when he read that made her think she might have loved him.

-- _four_ --

Bella Swan was fifteen when she got her first real kiss. She had always been one of those romance girls – the kind of girl whose daydreams aren't about the hot guy she sits next to in math class, or the latest big-thing celebrity, but the strange boy who sweeps her off her feet, taking her back to his castle and topping everything off with a red curtain and a happily-ever-after.

So when she was stuck in the back of the bus, alone, with Cameron Downs, she wasn't really expecting it when he leaned over and kissed her.

She also wasn't expecting to kiss him back, or to get this pleasant, tingly feeling in her stomach and suddenly want to touch his hair, even though it was blond, and she hadn't really liked blonds since Trent Vern had started dating Penny Fischer the summer after Bella decided she would marry him.

She wasn't expecting her toes to curl, or the way she wasn't worried about the girls two rows over that were staring or that she had gotten out of gym less than a half hour ago and probably looked like shit. She wasn't expecting to notice that he tasted a little like pineapple and sea salt, and she certainly wasn't expecting to _like_ it.

Bella was almost positive that all these things meant she loved him. And maybe that's what made it so hard when he moved to the east coast the next week, leaving her a letter and the hemp bracelet he used to wear.

Or, maybe, it's just that he wasn't her prince.

-- _five_ --

Edward Cullen was the first person Bella Swan would have died for.

She was seventeen and naive, but she wasn't stupid. Bella knew what she wanted – he was tall and beautiful and dead. She wanted _forever_ and endless nights and perfection. She wanted to go on being who she was, only _better_. She never realized that, all that time, the only thing Edward really wanted her to see was that she didn't _need_ to be.

The first thought of _real _love, Bella discovered, much later on, didn't come with Edward's smile, or his kisses, or even finding out his secret. It came when she recognized that it wasn't just Edward that she might have loved, but his family as well. The ties between them went deeper than what she saw as _normal_ love (the new friendships with Angela and Jess, the easy gossiping with Renee, the awkward hugs with Charlie), and she wanted it more than anything.

Being a part of this family – this _coven_ – meant she wouldn't have to worry about being herself. She wouldn't have to worry about the Penny Fischers and Lauren Mallorys, the broken hearts and divorces. The Cullens were complete – static, unchanging, and gorgeous. If loving Edward meant she could be all of that as well, than the things she had to give up were worth giving.

Books had taught her that love was sacrifice. Bella understood that better than anyone.

(And maybe that was the problem.)

-- --

When Bella was eighteen, she was dressed in white and looking at the mirror like a snowglobe. She could hear her pulse over the faint music coming from downstairs, and sweat trickled down her back and on to her dress.

None of this was strange to her, as she had expected nerves on her wedding day. What she couldn't understand was why she was thinking of Jacob Black.

Alice opened the door, sliding in and asking her if she was ready. Bella wanted very badly to say yes, to become a part of something bigger than her, something that made the moments she spent wishing in her childhood worth it. But she couldn't. It took every bone in her body to shake her head, to pull off the dress and grab her sweatshirt from the floor, throwing it on over her white slip and garter.

And when she got to La Push, and Jacob opened the door, she laughed along with him as he appraised her appearance.

And Bella knew.

It wasn't Prince-and-Princess love, or older-boy-crush love, or even wanting-to-be-part-of-something love. It was that her heart beat faster than she ever felt before when she thought of him. It was that when she imagined his laugh, she couldn't help but smile.

It wasn't that they were _meant_ for each other. They just _were_.

--

_end_


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